negativenullTechnology Connections - You are being misled about renewable energy technology.
JackDarkThanks for mentioning the last 30 minutes, but for additional clarity, there is a fake ending 30 minutes before the actual ending. Please watch those last 30 minutes!
artifexI will always upvote technology connections, I have watched so many videos of his about things I would have thought i couldn’t care less about and enjoyed them all!
This!!!
My highlight was the non lightening brake lights on electric cars when they are recuperating
That pisses me off to no end. The car knows how fast it is going, it has to show you. Just make the lights come on based on deceleration, regardless of how it happens. It doesn’t even need dedicated hardware. It’s just lazy coding and development.
What video was that? I think I haven’t seen that one.
They’re lying.
ObiniceGotta watch the video to find out.
You’re welcome!
Well, a little more bum crumble, if I’m being honest
Hahahahaha, funny interwebs person being a sarcastic edge! Such fresh comedic material, I’ve never encountered before
Or maybe for some things, you just shouldn’t… you’re only hurting yourself in the end
There’s a time and place for things, and garnering the wisdom to find the subtleties of that is something you should probably work on
Or continue forth being destructive for the lols and self-gratification, you’re hilarious — truly. Enjoy the dopamine hit while it lasts!
Big edit: sorry @fuckwit_mcbumcrumble … I got whooshed hard. I now see that yes, the tldw is indeed “They’re lying”. I feel a little dumb now, as I thought you meant the youtuber was lying; not that you had (super) summarized the subject. Very concise tldw, technically lol
Guess the video triggered me into also being tired of people lying, and thought you were being disinformative. My bad friend
First hour: Developing a detailed intuition for exactly how solar and wind energy work and what makes them so much better than oil (without mentioning climate change or pollution)
Last 30 min: Establishing a baseline moral framework that everyone can get behind, and explaining that under this framework a revolution against the Trump regime would be entirely justified but at a minimum we absolutely must vote against Republicans in the 2026 and 2028 elections.
As someone in the comments put it: he explains solar and then goes nuclear.
Damn, I love his stuff anyway, but this time I’m looking forward to watching it just to see how he incorporates a call for revolution against his government into a video about solar panels, haha
The “not mentioning climate change” is key. He hit people where it hurts for everyone (Democrats and Republicans) - not spending money.
I think it’s all pretty well-known in this community, but here’s a summary:
- Renewables (specifically solar + batteries) are an inevitable future of energy production due to technological advancements and the economies of scale improvements
- We are at a tipping point where solar + batteries is now the cheapest energy source available
- Land use for solar farms is not a big issue, they are much more energy efficient per unit area than the ethanol corn that currently plagues the US
- Recycling solar panels is relatively easy because they are mostly glass and aluminum, which we know how to recycle well, and we could probably figure out silicon too
- Recycling batteries is a harder problem but possible too if we put some effort in; currently the recycling capacity is lacking because there’s not enough batteries being recycled, since most of them are still working fine in EVs sold since the start of EV boom
- Renewables are better than fossil fuels because they do not require continuous extraction; when a solar panel or battery has been “used up” and is degraded, it can be recycled, whereas fossil fuels can only be burned once after extraction
- The end goal is an almost-closed-loop system for all energy production, similar to what we have with lead-acid batteries already
- Worst-case, we can literally just grind up batteries into battery mush and refine it, same as we do with ores from which the raw materials come in the first place, but likely something better is possible
- Alec describes his personal politics, how he values labor and working-class people, and how he thinks immigrants are hard-working people who need to be welcomed and cared for
- Trump and Republicans as a whole are fascists and lie constantly, which needs to be called out
- ICE must be abolished and its thugs tried for their crimes
- Democrats are not doing enough but it’s still better to vote for them
- People need to organize with their neighbors, care for each other first and foremost, and defend themselves against the government
His social media is very political, he’s on bluesky.
Hell his YouTube is quite political if you understand the little p politics he expresses. When he talked about elevators and captioning he’s been vocally in support of resources going to making the world more accessible to disabled people (and he puts his money where his mouth is, hand captioning all of his own videos). He’s mostly been vocal about the need for doing something about climate change. Then there’s also the video about algorithms that clearly originates from him being pissed about people wanting to invade Canada.
oce 🐆Any mention of nuclear energy and the difference of land and resources required in comparison?
TVANot directly, but a key point of his thesis is that solar by itself (with batteries) can provide 85% more power than we currently use by only using the land that currently grows corn for biofuel on. He mentions wind as well.
Nuclear has its own lies spread about it that are completely independent of what renewables get and it has its own caveats, so, it does kind of make sense to not really bring it up since that could warrant its own video. Illinois has nuclear power, so, I can't imagine it was an accidental oversight.
Not finished it yet but it annoys me so much that for some reason it is VASTLY cheaper for me to buy a briefcase or two full of batteries for my house than it is for the same to be done in bulk at the scale of the grid.
Just batteries would cut my energy costs to about a third of their current rate by charging them at cheaper off peak prices. Isn’t it insane that this is a feature of the current energy market?
It is in some markets. California PG&e has it, Texas is offering subsidies in some cities for it, and I’ve heard that it’s becoming popular in the UK too (octopus iirc).
undersells the advantage of solar over corn ethanol land use by a lot. At least 2x. Excluding high energy/equipment cost of fermenting ethanol, overstating mileage, and understating EV mileage. The point of ethanol is purely to pay farmers for useless work, but they can make far more with less work from solar. Corn farmers in US have lost money for 4 consecutive years. Excluding land costs, their costs is $650/acre/year, excluding their time/labour. Cashflow per acre $97 @ $4/bushel. At 2.5 hours/day for $30/hour, profit before rent-equivalent drops to $22/acre
In Nebraska, solar costs $1/watt to install (before recent permitting BS). China costs $0.50/w (no tariffs, cheaper construction services/equipment). An acre in Nebraska can hold 400kw of solar, and produce 630k kwh/year (edit: correction). It breaks even at 5c/kwh with 5% financing of whole installation (with system paid off in 25 years, even though it keeps producing) including $4000 O&M costs (high, because its washing dust and leaves 1-2 times per week). Every 1c/kwh revenue higher is $6300/acre profit,
Since ethanol is just a gift to farmers/rural land owners. Giving them 2%/financing rate as the gift and 4c/kwh in revenue is the same profit per acre, and at 5c/kwh, massively higher ($6300) profit. For US car drivers, instead of paying $0.12/mile (a 25mpg gasoline car will use 5.4 gallons ethanol/100 miles at $2.20/gallon). 18c/kwh charging for EV means $0.05/mile. Massive cost reduction already, but tariffs and other BS removal can provide significantly more value for farmers and drivers.
Also if making a fuel (that is also key input for local fertilizer production for neighbour farmers) is important, H2 electrolysis at 5c/kwh input makes $3.50/kg H2. equivalent to above 17.5c/kwh EV charging, excluding the battery charger losses. It is 10x cheaper to move by pipe than it is to move electricity by wire, while also doubling as storage, and even better home energy applications by using waste heat for free hot water. H2 has same 2.4x advantage over ethanol cost, but you can produce an unlimited amount to sell to places that need more energy seasonally, or to blast stuff into space.
If we didn’t already have an electric infrastructure, hydrogen pipes would be spreading everywhere.
Renewables transition needs new distribution. Electric grid system in US especially and west in general has extremely poor supply chain for new transformers. If there is an effort in transmission/distribution expansion, an H2 economy is very competitive to electricity. Delivery by truck is feasible for rural homes. If new electric transmission costs 10c/kwh (existing national average charge is about 8c/kwh), then a $2/kg delivery charge is competitive. Pipelines would be 20c/kg, equivalent to 1c/kwh transmission charges.
Policy supports extortionist monopolists with incumbent climate terrorist fuels, and structurally made to stay that way, until we agree on whether war on Minnesotans is good or bad, and can move on to examining structural corruption issues.
God, fuck ethanol. Last I checked it literally took 1.5 gallons of oil/gas to produce 1 gallon of ethanol. It turns more fuel into less fuel and pisses away soil fertility doing it.
I read an article some time ago arguing the purpose of ethanol (and ag subsidies in general) is, consciously or unconsciously, manifest destiny - we have to have a “use” for all the land we stole, we have to do something with it even if that something is a complete waste, because otherwise, people might start asking why we don’t give it back. Seems more likely to me all the time.
It’s the power of a voting class. Origins are geopolitics of 70s oil crisis. Then vote buying of rural areas. Most of the legislative giveaways were titled “clean air something”. There is a food security argument for grains (livestock is a food battery, and ethanol is surplus monetization)
There is a high oil-related cost portion of corn farming. Close to $300 of the $650/acre is fertilizer ($225), tractor fuel, pesticides. The last 4 years of corn farming losses is also during low NG price. The minimal profit before rent-equivalence can go negative at higher NG price, because ethanol is only blended into gasoline when gasoline is expensive, and then corn only bought for cheap when it is not. The US always has a high oil price policy, and geopolitical insecurity to achieve it. Weapons-oil industry is deep state establishment pushing for war and higher oil prices, and more corn helps, and politicians are rewarded with larger bribery war chests.
Energy insecurity for Americans comes from relying on geopolitical manipulated energy subscription to live/operate. Farmers need export markets, which makes it good for them for US to not be hated by all of their markets. US oligarchy is also invested in high electricity prices/profits for incumbents. Datacenter bubble is ideal oligarchism alliance with tech.
The point of my post is that farming/rural areas can be weaned from the oil oligarchy voting block. Much cleaner air argument. Genuine energy security that comes from 0 reliance on future geopolitics/supply chains. Better corn prices if some corn farmers switch to solar. Lower oil prices if less of it is wasted on farming and cars. Lower electricity prices and abundance to fund whatever skynet priority to better kill us all, but without us going broke first.
I think there’s absolutely a place for corn ethanol in America. It’s called bourbon, and that’s about it. Other biofuels are likely necessary for energy density required situations such as aviation, but I strongly suspect that there’s better options for that than ethanol
I think there’s something wrong with your math did you mean 630MWh/yr?
ty. corrected. original said 630kwh/year
One other thing is if the farm adds some batteries they can sell the electricity at peak times for 20-30c/kwh.
“That’s it. That’s the end of the video. Don’t look at the timestamp, don’t–”
*Always Sunny music*
Alec Gets Radicalized
SubArcticTundra“A wind turbine is like an oil derrick that generates eq. 3 gallons of gasoline evry single minute.”
Except the wind never runs out. Also we can use the energy from wind turbines 3x as efficiently as we can the energy from a barrel of oil. Carnot is a bitch.
mercWind sometimes runs out (as in, calm weather) and wind turbines do eventually run out after a few decades. But, 3 gallons of gasoline-equivalent per minute seemed a bit small for my intuition, so I did some back of the envelope calculations to compare it to pumpjacks for oil.
I’m doing these calculations in metric, because the US traditional units are insane, and nobody should subject themselves to that.
3 gallons is about 11.3L, so 11.3L per minute is 678 L per hour, or about 16 kL of “gasoline-equivalent” per day.
Apparently a pumpjack pumps about 5 to 40 “barrels” of crude oil per day. A barrel is 159 L so that’s 795 L to 6360 L per day.
So, the back of the envelope “how much ‘energy’ does this big mechanical thing produce” seems fairly similar, ignoring a whole lot of complexity.
That last 30 minutes earned a new Patreon subscription. I hope this starts a trend.
Only now do you start feeling the urgency of the situation, when usually apolitical channels have started discussing politics.
HarkMahlberg"If you've been watching my channel for any length of time, then you should already have a pretty clear understanding of what my personal politics are. If you've been under the impression that I've not been political, you simply don't understand what politics means. I have indeed stayed out of partisan politics and electoral politics, but I've been wearing my personal politics on my sleeve this whole time, and they've not been that subtle."
bdonvr
GreeNRG
ProdigalFrogHe hasn’t done any videos on computers, AFAIK. His channel covers a wide range of topics, from washing machines, car blinkers, heaters, refrigerators, to christmas lights. You can see his backlog here.
AND HEAT PUMPS!!!
I highly recommend the series on the CED and the downfall of RCA. He's also got a number of videos about various cameras which are also great!
Lots of great stuff, lots of retro tech and common how it works stuff. His dishwasher video makes it so there is no reason to wash things by hand pretty much ever.
As someone on reddit said, “I could disappear bodies in my dishwasher.”